About PPGSSocial

The Stricto Sensu Postgraduate Program - Academic Master's in Social Work at UFT was approved by CAPES/MEC on 26/10/2018 and implements a long-time desire of the social work professors of the University's Social Work Program and the graduates and social workers of the State of Tocantins. This program was being planned by the faculty council of the UFT Social Work Program since 2010, because during this period there was the academic ranking of professors, the strengthening of scientific production in the area and the creation, in 2017, of the first Lato Sensu postgraduate class - Specialization in Social Service and Social Policy, ten years after the creation of the undergraduate program at UFT.

Following a long trajectory up to 2018, the category of Social Workers has, according to information released by the Federal Council of Social Work (CFESS), 160 thousand registered professionals, in the 26 regional councils based in the different Brazilian states, bearing in mind that social service is recognized as an area of knowledge linked to the applied social sciences. In Tocantins, the trajectory of the profession is linked to the state's foundation movement and the structuring of implemented social organs, institutions and policies. Regarding the profile of social workers based in Tocantins, according to the data offered by the Regional Council of Social Work (CRESS 25th Region), there are 2,393 professionals registered in total. Regarding the training of these professionals, 1,630 graduated from programs in the present teaching modality and 763 were linked to the distance learning modality. In a study by Garcia and Nogueira (2017) on the postgraduate program in Social Work in Brazil, it is possible to see the following reality: of the 34 programs linked to the Social Work area (A32), 12 are in the Southeast region (36.4%), 11 in the Northeast (33.3%), 5 in the South Region (15.2%), 3 in the Midwest (9%) and 2 are in the North Region (6%). Thus, 69.7% of the programs are concentrated in the Southeast and Northeast regions.

This highlights the importance of another master's program for the Northern Region and, particularly, for the State of Tocantins, which is geographically distant from other universities that offer postgraduate programs at the Master's and Doctorate levels in Social Work in the region. Due to this distance, many of our graduates and social work professionals have difficulty accessing stricto sensu postgraduate programs. The result of this is reflected in the small number of professionals with a postgraduate degree in social work present in the state. As of 2017, UFT's Social Work Program has produced 167 social workers and is currently the most consolidated program, in terms of teaching staff, at the Miracema Campus.

Technical Sheet